Did you know that CMS provided Quality and Resource Use Reports (QRURs) to physicians in groups of all sizes and physician solo practitioners in September of 2014? The 2013 QRURs provide clinically meaningful and actionable information that can be used to improve the quality and efficiency of care provided to Medicare beneficiaries and also to understand and improve performance on quality and cost measures. If you are a physician subject to the Value-Based Payment Modifier (VM) Program, the reports also contain information about how your performance is affecting your Medicare payments in 2015.

By a vote of 392 – 37, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 2, the Medicare Access and CHIP (Children's Health Insurance Program) Reauthorization Act of 2015, which, among other things, would permanently repeal and replace the SGR formula.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that the submission deadlines for the PQRS reporting methods below have been extended. All other submission timeframes for other PQRS reporting methods remain the same.

Last Year for Eligible Hospitals to Begin EHR Participation and Earn Incentive Payments is 2015

Eligible hospitals that miss this deadline can still earn a 2015 incentive payment—and avoid the 2017 payment adjustment—if they begin their reporting period by July 1 and attest by November 30. However, they will be subject to the 2016 payment adjustment unless they apply and qualify for a hardship exception.

Hospitals that successfully attest in 2015 will also be eligible to earn a 2016 incentive if they continue to participate.

Eligible hospitals that begin participating after 2015 will not be able to earn incentive payments. They will also be subject to payment adjustments in 2016 and 2017.

Reforms to Medicare regulations identified as unnecessary, obsolete, or excessively burdensome on hospitals and other health care providers will save nearly $660 million annually, and $3.2 billion over five years, through a rule issued today by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid services (CMS).

CMS Announces Intent to Engage in Rulemaking for EHR Incentive Program Changes for 2015

In response to input from health care providers and other stakeholders, CMS is considering the following changes to the Medicare and Medicaid Incentive Programs:

Shortening the 2015 reporting period to 90 days to address provider concerns about their ability to fully deploy 2014 Edition software Electronic Health Record (EHR)

Realigning hospital reporting periods to the calendar year to allow eligible hospitals more time to incorporate 2014 Edition software into their workflows and to better align with other quality programs

These proposed changes reflect the Department of Health and Human Services’ commitment to creating a health information technology infrastructure that:

Elevates patient-centered care

Improves health outcomes

Supports the providers who care for patients

While CMS intends to pursue these changes through rulemaking, they will not be included in the pending Stage 3 proposed rule. CMS intends to limit the scope of the pending proposed rule to Stage 3 and meaningful use in 2017 and beyond.

2014 EHR Reporting Deadline Approaching

If you are an eligible professional participating in the Medicare EHR Incentive Program, you have until February 28, 2015 to attest to demonstrating meaningful use of the data collected during your EHR reporting period for the 2014 calendar year. If you are participating in the Medicaid EHR Incentive Program, please refer to your state’s deadlines for attestation information.

While patient portals are not new, getting patients to use them is a common challenge. Whether your practice has had a patient portal in place for years or months, getting your patients to use it is what matters most. The importance is magnified as Meaningful Use stage 2 requires that 5% of patients must actively use the patient portal. Getting your patients to use the patient portal isn’t impossible. In fact, patients want to use your patient portal. They are demanding access to their health information and want to take charge of their health. It is up to you to teach them how to do it.

2015 is here and with it comes 550 changes to CPT coding. Every year brings updates, additions, and deletions of CPT codes. How you handle the changes can make your start to 2015 profitable or painful.

With Christmas just around the corner, many physicians and practice managers are adding billing services to their wish list. In fact, 71% of physician practices are considering a combination of new software and outsourcing services to improve their RCM systems.

Whether you're just starting out with an ICD-10 plan of action (hopefully not) or you have been preparing for years, it is easy to become overwhelmed and forget everything that a good ICD-10 plan entails.

When it comes to ICD-10 codes and Thanksgiving, it just doesn't get much better than this. Here are 11 tips to avoiding any mishaps during your Thanksgiving celebration that could result in an odd ICD-10 diagnosis code.

With the transition from paper to electronic health records also comes the assumption that physicians would be better positioned to document better. The use of templates and structured data may satisfy the CIO but the physicians are facing a technology challenge. Physicians are continuously searching for the right EMR software to help them overcome the challenges of documentation while CIOs seek data to support internal and external clinical outcomes reporting.